20 years ago
@77eda587a3=Unapproachable:
Rawlinswood
The Rawlinswood forms the northern border of the Great Dale, weaving its way south of the Giantspire Mountains and the plains of Narfell until it peters out near the Cold Road and the Firward Mountains. Once, the Rawlinswood was a northern twin to the Forest of Lethyr, but a horrid evil has clawed its way out of the black earth, poisoning the Rawlinswood and filling its green gloom with blood, disease and madness. The sinister Rotting Man (NE half-fiend human Druid12/Talontar Blightlord 10, Chosen of Talona) leads a dark circle of evil clerics and druids devoted to the Lady of Poison and, through these blightlords, a growing host of blightspawned volodni warriors that menace all the nearby lands.
The Rawlinswood is a mixture of deciduous and evergreen trees along its southern border but quickly becomes a soggy taiga as once travels north from the Dale. Treacherous muskeg bogs fester above a deep layer of permafrost, giving rise to clouds of mosquitoes inteh Rawlinswood's short summer. In its northwestern reaches, the forest climbs sharply towards the Giantspire Mountains, covering rugged foothills and deep shadowed vales. Like all of the Great Dale, it also rises toward the east, and it's easternmost reaches are quite hilly. The forests narrows to a narrow band only twenty-five miles wide about two-thirds of the way along its length, moving from west to east.
The now abandoned settlement of Denderdale is located here along the northern edge, almost enclosed by the reaching arms of the forest. The way isn't long, comparatively, and those who are eloquent or desperate enough may be able to hire a guide to take them to the south side of the of the forest or back.
Just to the northwest of the forest is the Damaran settlement of Tellreth, hard by the Long Road. For years, the Circle of Leth worked to stop the encroachement of Damaran and Impulturian loggers into the western reaches of the Rawlinswood, but the Nentyarch's followers have been driven into the Forest of Lethyr and no longer patrol this area. The humans now face the Rotting Man and his rising tide of evil.
Dun-Tharos
Once the capital of the ancient Empire of Narfell, Dun-Tharos sprawls for miles through the pines and bogs at the heart of the Rawlinswood. From this place, the Nentyarchs (as the rulers of ancient Narfell were known) ruled a great and terrible realm of dark keeps and proud, sinister lords. Dun-Tharos was laid waste in the final cataclysmic war between Raumathar and Narfell, the entire city leveled by some mighty spell of unspeakable power. So ended the Nentyarchs and thier demon-haunted kingdom.
Centuries past, and the forest grew over the great black scar in its heart. A group of druids and rangers - the Circle of Leth - undertook the work of healing the wounded land. Theier leader took the title of Nentyarch anew to signify that the druids of Leth ruled over the heart of ancient Narfell. In the ruins of Dun-Tharos, the new Nentyarch raised a fortress to govern the great forest. The black keep of the old demonpriests was reborn into a castle of living trees, woven by druidic magic.
From this forest-castle the Nentyarchs ruled for nearly six hundred years, preserving the Forest of Lethyr and the Rawlinswood from encroachment by human kingdoms on all sides. The ruins of the old Nar capital reminded the druids of humanity's ability to harm nature, and the forest that had swallowed its black stones offered an example of what might be accomplished with patience and strength.
All things come to an end, though. Ten years ago, the Rotting Man, Chosen of Talona, began to gather a circle of dark druids in the western reaches of the Rawlinswood. The Circle of Leth fought against the rising power of the blightlords and contained the Rotting Man in the west, but two years ago the Rotting man created a terrible new weapon to use against the Nentyarch - the blight of Talona. He corrupted a handful of captured Leth druids, changing them into blightlords who serve him. Through these tortured minions, he ensnared hundreds of volodni and infected them with Talona's blight. At Midwinter in 1371 DR, he hurled his blightspawned army at tghe Nentyarch's fortress and drove the Circle of Leth out of the Rawlinswood.
Dun-Tharos is still a castle of trees, but they are now dead, animated through the Rotting Man's fould sorcery. Hundreds of his minions lurk in the ruins of Narfell's old capital, ready to surge forth and slay at his command. His blightspawned warriors slaughtered the small community of Denderdale, north of the forest, only two months ago, and bands of evil volodni harry the clanholds and farmsteads south of the forest. Dun-Tharos has become a place of death and madness again.
